Fast Forward

For a few hours there, I was stuck thinking to myself, "Damn. I can not think of anything interesting to have happen while the inventions are being built! Maybe I could think up some jokes about building things if I really, really wanted, but they'd feel forced and everyone would know I was trying too hard for it. What's to be done? How can I skip ahead to the day of the contest without just passing over everything in between?"

Then I realized that just plain skipping ahead was an option! So I did it. But, still wanting to have some chuckles and events, I put some goings-on in the background: Otto experiments with a boombox and "microphone", Dido and Puppy dress like scientists (I even gave them little pocket protectors), Ike works with her straightedge and compass, and Brock, who may or may not have come to understand the terms of the contest by now, appears to have fallen asleep. Pretty much everything that occurs is either a straight-up copy or a mild tweak of a copy of something that's happened before.

Anyway. Hopefully sometime in the near future, I'll get around to the unveiling of the various inventions and the inevitable meeting of the Negatopes.